Buyers across Ontario who want metalwork made close to home can find it at 710 Pioneer Road in Chisholm, roughly 20 minutes outside North Bay. VB Steel is owned and run by Ian and Lisa Van Blyderveen. Ian started working with metal 26 years ago in structural steel and custom fabrication, and the person who prices a job at this shop is the same one who welds it later.Most work here begins with a description, a photo, or a rough sketch. A drawing goes back to the customer as a screenshot for sign-off, and nothing reaches the table until the sizing is agreed. Custom fabrication in Ontario through VB Steel includes brackets, frames, reinforcements, stairs, railings, gates, fencing, fire pits, beams, and columns, as well as steel signs and spinners sold through the online shop. The CNC plasma cutter handles material up to 1 inch thick on a 5-foot-by-10-foot table and cuts any conductive metal, including copper, brass, and aluminum. Square tubing, angle, flat bar, and plate are kept in stock, and anything not on the floor gets ordered in.
"Someone sends in a sketch of what they have got in their head, and a while later it exists in steel. That never gets old," a company spokesperson said. "We put a drawing in front of the customer before a single cut happens, so the dimensions are settled early. Every piece is made here in our own shop by our own people, and we are glad to put our name on it."
Ian holds a Red Seal as a Structural Plate Fitter/Welder and is a CWB Certified Welding Supervisor. The company itself is certified to CWB Division 2. More than 30,000 projects and parts have gone out the door. Most finished pieces are powder-coated, meaning the powder is sprayed electrostatically onto the metal and then cured in an oven at roughly 350 to 420 degrees, a finish that holds up against road salt and freeze-thaw much longer than paint on bare metal. Signs are usually cut from 16-gauge steel, with 14-gauge and 11-gauge used on larger pieces.
Finished orders ship across Canada. Delivery and installation can be arranged for North Bay and the surrounding area, priced per order. The shop keeps regular weekday hours and closes on weekends. Sketches and job descriptions can be sent through the contact form on the website.
About VB Steel
VB Steel is a family-owned custom metal fabrication and welding company operating from Chisholm, Ontario, and serving North Bay and the wider region. The shop covers CNC plasma cutting, certified welding, powder-coated finishing, and raw steel supply, and takes on both one-off pieces and repeat production runs for residential, commercial, and industrial customers. It also produces a line of steel signs and outdoor décor sold online and shipped Canada-wide. Everything is made in-house rather than imported and resold. For more information, visit https://vbsteel.ca/